


Floriography

by saltyhealer



Series: Halcyon Days [1]
Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: F/F, Gen, Mostly genfic tbh bc i want people to be nice to mercy, Pre-Fall of Overwatch, also ignoring ow canon timelines and canon, bc it's stupid
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-08-05
Updated: 2016-08-05
Packaged: 2018-07-29 10:03:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,239
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7680166
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/saltyhealer/pseuds/saltyhealer
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A study of the flowers that cover Doctor Angela Zeigler’s desk and those who left them.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Floriography

Angela was as lovely as the flowers that crowded her work desk.

Leaving flowers for the good doctor had become a time honored tradition at the Zurich headquarters. Angela’s labs were always bright and warm, as if to counter the unspoken macabre aspects of her profession. They overlooked the manicured grounds of Overwatch’s headquarters and the snowy peaks beyond, far from the hangers, shooting ranges and barracks. Often, on warm enough days, Angela would leave the windows to the grounds open and many recruits, new and veteran alike, would perch in the sills and keep the doctor company, or simply sit to listen to her selection of classics that day.

> (Vivaldi had become a personal favourite of McCree’s, who spent many afternoons napping in the doctor’s window, hat tipped down and hiding from Gabriel. The Blackwatch commander would never raise his voice around Angela and the ex-Deadlock member abused that weakness to no end.)

Gabriel and Jack were the worst offenders. Their privileges as Overwatch’s elite let them out of the facility more often than the others and they brandished those benefits with abandon, travelling into the city below and returning with gifts and treats for those who asked.

Angela never asked for the Queen Anne’s Lace and asters that decorated her labs but her desk overflowed with them nonetheless. Jack could be spotted more often than not with a purple aster tucked surreptitiously behind his ear, or Gabe with a small white flower peeking from the fold of his beanie, cheeky reminders that they were responsible for the tradition.

The commanders brought flowers and doctor’s precisely crafted visage of stern dedication would fall away under the armfuls of blossoms and kisses on her cheeks from both Jack and Gabe.

She was always soft with them; and they soft with her.

-|-

Lena’s flowers never seemed to die, as if her own unstable nature clung to what she could leave behind in the brief moments she was present. Her ghost flickered in and out but the soft petals of carnations remained bright and full of life well into the cold minter months.

As her molecules stabilised and Angela finally had a chance to examine the young Brit. Lena “Tracer” Oxtons never seemed to stop talking. Most thought this would annoy the aloof and distant doctor but Angela seemed pleased by the constant chatter. In truth, Angela just wanted to commit Tracer to memory, to heart.

> (Talking to Angela was one of the few things that kept Lena stable. In the whirlwind of time and shifting she’d found herself in the labs one afternoon. She felt lost, she was confused and scared and she gripped Angela’s hand.
> 
> “Never forget me, love,” she begged, before time consumed her.)

It was looking over Lena, Gabe and Jack nearby to evaluate Angela’s findings and Tracer’s potential to join Overwatch, when Angela first saw Amélie LaCroix.

The woman walked by the lab, sunlight streaming in and catching in her long black ponytail and dark skin, lips pulled into a smile as she laughed.

Angela dropped her pen and the sudden movement brought Jack and Gabriel out of a whispered conversation, eyeing the doctor and then following her gaze to the new arrival outside her labs. She tried to avert her gaze, focusing back on Lena but the smirk that pulled at Gabe’s lips was evidence enough.

Now Lena was watching as well as the tall woman was brought to the doors of Angela’s labs by Winston. There was another man with her, just barely able to hide his outright glee and his head peeked around the corner of the doors, eyeing every inch of the labs, ignoring the people inside of it.

Winston cleared his throat and the man’s eyes flicked to him sheepishly and he stood up properly. “Angela, Commanders, Tracer,” Winston said, “this is Gérard and Amélie Lacroix, they’re partners and will be joining us in our research department.”

Gérard raised a hand, awkwardly waving, while Amélie bowed her head slightly, long hair gently falling over her shoulder. Angela could feel Gabriel’s smirk widening behind her.

“You’re the daughter of the Zieglers, right?” Gérard blurted out, breaking the building silence, “I apprenticed under them, their work in nanotech was revolutionary. It’s nice to see you’ve continued their work.”

Angela felt her entire body going stiff, arm tightening around her clipboard as her smile slipped onto her lips and a strained laugh left her throat.

“Well, I couldn’t let all their hard work go to waste,” she said, words mechanical and practiced.

Even though she felt Jack’s hand on her shoulder and Gabriel moving to place himself between her and the source of her discomfort, it was Amélie  who was her saving grace.

“Gérard,” she admonished in lilting tones, “we lost the Zieglers so recently, I’m sure Angela is still recovering.”

Her soft brown eyes found Angela’s and she offered a small smile, one free of the pity that Angela was so used to. It was apologetic and warm, familiar in its grief. Angela pressed her back into Jack’s chest and felt his fingers squeeze her shoulder while Gabriel now stood at the door, looming.

“We’ll continue the tour,” Winston said after a long heavy pause, large hands urging Gérard onward.

Amélie  remained behind long enough to peek past Gabriel and wave a little. “I look forward to working with you, Angela.” She said, long strides catching her up with Winston and Gérard in a few steps.

Once they were out of sight, Angela turned around and wrapped her arms around Jack, folding herself into him, as much to hide her sudden grief but also to hide the blush high on her cheeks.

-|-

At first Angela had no idea who was leaving her the sprigs of lavender and honeyflowers. It was only Gabriel passing by her office and remarking that it smelt of his apprentice’s laundry that she strung the pieces together.

Perhaps it was their ages that drew McCree to her, or the gentle music that drifted from her labs, a siren song to the cowboy, or just a crush that blossomed over late nights together when Jack and Gabriel were off on a mission and they were left to their own devices, but McCree’s feelings for her were not entirely unexpected.

His crush was sweet as the flowers he left her and Angela was careful when she turned him down, pressing a crocus into his rough and callused hands. At first he did not relent, but as time went on and their watching Fareeha together while the commanders were gone became increasingly awkward, Jesse let the crush go.

Feelings blossoming into daffodils that earned a place at her writing desk, Jesse still perched in her windows to listen to her music and pester her, because if he didn’t, who would?

> (The sun was at the edge of the sky, casting the grounds into a soft autumn glow, when Angela turned Jesse down. The labs were nearly empty, night chasing away most of the assistants save Amélie and Angela.
> 
> “It’s awful sweet of ya to turn me down like this,” Jesse said, holding her hands in his as his eyes fell to Amélie working through the window, “though I s’pose my competition was pretty fearsome.” And he’d smiled that dagger sharp smirk he’d picked up from Reyes when she blushed.)

When Gabe entered her labs late, they were both notorious night owls, Angela didn’t even look up from her work to mumble “Don’t say a damn thing, Reyes.”

He sat down next to her and rumbled with barely contained laughter. “A crush, my apprentice had a _crush_ on you.”

She drove her elbow into his side and he swatted her away, twitching and laughing only harder. “He is sweet...”

“He might be sweet but he isn’t _your_ kind of sweet.”

“What’s that supposed to mean, exactly?”

Gabe levelled his gaze at her, eyebrow quirking in the faintest hint of suggestion. “I think you’re looking for a bit more of the ‘ _ma chérie_ ’ brand of sweetness.” He nearly cooed, replicating Amélie’s accent with deadly precision.

Angela turned her face resolutely to her desk, absently fixing charts and papers on it. “I have no idea what you mean. Amélie is a good friend and a wonderful…” Trailing off, Angela sighed and gave in, slumping onto her desk and burying her face in her arms.

“She’s wonderful and sweet and kind… I’ve never met someone as smart and talented as her,” she babbled into her arms, ignoring Gabriel’s hand on her head, “she’s helping me so much with Valkyrie suit’s specs and she’s been so nice about everything. Dammit, she’s so pretty too.”

Expended, Angela sunk further onto her desk and Gabe’s hand tugged at the ends of her ponytail thoughtfully. He waited to see if there was any more words left in her before speaking, voice gentle in the way he reserved for her and his little sisters back home.

“Have you told her?”

“No. She has a husband.”

Gabe barked out a laugh. “I think we can all see at this point that she married him for his citizenship and nothing else.”

Carefully, Angela raised her head, strands of blonde from Gabriel’s picking falling into her face. “What if she just thinks I’m a whiny child with a name I can’t live up to?” Her voice was quiet, the admission one Gabriel had heard before. “That’s all I am in the end…”

“Ah… _Mi cielo_ ,” Gabriel said, tucking the stray strands behind her ear, “we’re all just dumb whiny kids here, you just happen to be the most competent whiny child here.”

Shoving a halfhearted fist against his chest, Angela sniffled weakly. “You’re the worst.”

“I’m not Jackie, I’m not so great at the peptalks. But you should tell her, Angela,” he tilted her chin up, letting their eyes meet and prodded her nose, “instead of dropping your pencil every time she speaks to you.”

“I don’t drop it _every_ time.”

-|-

Angela’s desk overflowed with flowers after Reinhardt and the Amaris returned from their overnight trips. It was a tradition in itself, the three packing up dried food and sleeping bags and heading off into the Alps for a few days. Part of it was to train Fareeha in survival and orientation, but mostly it was to get the young girl away from the base and give her tired babysitters some well deserved rest.

Edelweiss was Reinhardt’s favourite, the small flowers dwarfed in his hands as he carefully wove them together in a crown for Angela. Even when the white petals drooped she and Reinhardt would carefully find large books to press them into, saving them between pages of medical terms and anatomic diagrams.

> ("One day they’re going to make you retire, Wilhem.”
> 
> His hands, gentle and steady as hers despite their size, press together timidly. “They will try perhaps, but I am a lion’s heart, _Meine Liebste._ No one will ever make me do anything.”)

The soft bulbs of lotuses that Ana brought were never from the mountain hikes, but still seemed to appear alongside Reinhardt’s edelweiss. The petals stayed curled up with each other, hibernating for days on end until Angela would wake up one morning after falling asleep at her desk and the lotus were open, brilliant pink caught in the morning sun and Ana would be waiting, holding out a coffee and warm bread.

Fareeha brought fistfuls of buttercups and Angela happily showed her their glow under her chin, teasing that she must love butter if the buttercup reflected so beautifully under her tiny jaw. Fareeha proceeded to test every member of Overwatch and with the sun so bright that day it was determined that everyone loved butter.

On days sunny enough to make buttercups shine, Amélie left the labs to join Ana outside on the grounds for training. Amélie insisted she wanted to help Ana learn the Biotic Rifle she and Torbjörn had been working on and seemed to help by learning how to shoot. Rather than test the rifle in the shooting range, Ana and Amélie used the grounds outside the labs so Angela could reach them if the prototype went haywire.

Today the rifle seemed stable enough and Torbjörn had fallen asleep in a slice of sunlight on one of the lab’s couches while Angela watch Ana and Amélie work, elbows perched on the windowsill as she watched.

Ana was all calm flirting while she worked with Amélie and the researcher didn’t seem to mind the sniper’s firm hands guiding her hips and shoulders, resting on her waist between shots. When it was Ana’s turn to test her gun Amélie’s hands were just as wandering, though they kept to Ana’s shoulder, resting her chin on them to whisper into her ear. Ana always smiled and made perfect shots even when Amélie whispered.

But whenever Ana focused, taking aim, Amélie looked at Angela and smiles.

By now Angela had learnt the language of Amélie’s smiles. Tired ones when Gérard was working late on another operation to strike at Talon and had not returned. Flat and unimpressed when another researcher new to the labs tried to explain Amelie’s own findings to her. The brilliant ones that parted her lips and made her laugh when Fareeha worked McCree to the bone, hiding under Amelie’s desk to avoid the cowboy’s ill-planned game of hide and seek.

Gentle whenever Angela and her worked late into the night on the Valkyrie suit, fitting it to Angela and working out every malfunction until it was perfect.

But the one Amélie was giving her now made her feel too warm, melting her insides and heat pooling in the pit of her stomach. It was unknown, one she’d never quite see on Amelie’s lips but she’d seen it on Gabriel’s whenever Jack was being particularly rowdy. Flirtatious, inviting, and absolutely undressing him from head to foot.

Angela smacked her head so hard on the partially open window that Torbjörn woke up. Eyes welling with tears of pain and cheeks red, Angela sat on the floor and let the mechanic patch her up while outside she could hear Amelie’s laughter and it only made her insides melt further.

-|-

As Torbjörn spent time in the labs developing the healing tech that would keep their soldiers alive, he originally scoffed at the soft traditions of flowers. His face turned the most vibrant of crimson when Reinhardt placed a crown of edelweiss on his head. The result of that incident had been Reinhardt’s hammer mysteriously malfunctioning and the thrusters reversed in the heat of combat.

Even with a broken nose Reinhardt took the slight in stride and continued to leave little flowers scattered around the Swed’s workshop.

Eventually, as the days wore on and Torbjörn was in the labs more than his workshop he started to warm up to the tradition, but his flowers were nothing close to the other Angela had received. Metal bouquets in the precise mimicry of sage flowers, long elegant stalks engraved and petals burnt with a careful precision to a vivid and alive violet. They were durable enough to survive anything the lab threw at them and earned their place there among the biotic testing.

> (“It’s a slippery slope, Torbjörn.”
> 
> Torbjörn considered her over his flask, low light of the lab casting shadows over his eyes. “I know, Angela, but I think we started sliding down a long time ago.”)

With another person in the lab the growing tension between Angela and Amélie seemed to abate slightly. Ever since the incident with the window and the training, Angela had done her best to keep space between her and Amélie. The development of the rifle helped with that, keeping all three of them very busy late into the night.

Torbjörn had been up for nearly three days straight and had finally succumbed to tiredness, patting the two on the shoulders before sleepily stumbling from the room. Angela, awake for only two days, was too tired to realise that she and Amélie were the only ones left in the lab until the Amélie’s shoulder pressed to hers.

“I think we could change the reload structure here,” Amélie said while Angela tried very hard not to think of the rose perfume clinging to Amélie, “make it smoother, perhaps if we changed the vial design.” As she tilted her head in thought, the amethysts at her ear caught the light.

Angela nodded and quickly pulled away, desperate to get that space between them and turned to the table behind them. Pulling blueprints towards her she cleared her throat and forced her blush down.

“We can make the vials out of something more lightweight,” Angela started but her voice trailed off as Amélie’s hand grazed her elbow, holding it and turning her around slowly. Their eyes met, Amélie silhouetted in the desk lap behind her, the gems at her ears bringing out jeweled tones in her skin.

Amélie smiled, worried and soft. “Angela, _ma chérie_ , you have been avoiding me lately.” She said it so simply that all of Angela’s protests shrivelled up in her mouth and she hung her head. Amélie fingers squeezed her elbow. “I don’t want you to feel uncomfortable while I am here. I can go work with Gérard-”

“Oh no. No, I don’t want you to leave.” Angela blurted, quickly covering her mouth as if to keep the words in and to half cover her face. “I mean. I enjoy your company Amélie. You’re a brilliant doctor and…”

The unfinished sentence hung in the air and Angela stared at Amélie, wishing that she could sink into the floor with each stretching second of awkward silence.

“And?” Amélie prompted, moving closer.

Angela could see the facets in the amethysts at her ears.

“And,” Angela said, hand dropping from her hand to brace against the table she was pushed against, gripping the side of it, her only anchor, “and you’re… Really tempting.”

She felt Amélie’s laugh against her lips. “Tempting?”

“I mean in a not- bad way.” Angela mumbled, eyes dropping from Amélie’s eyes and so her lips, curved into a small and perfect smile. A smile for her.

The doors slid open and Torbjörn’s uneven footsteps echoed into the labs. Angela quickly ducked her head, turning her cheek so that it pressed to Amélie’s shoulder, feeling her face go red. Amélie seemed amused, her laughter ghosting over Angela’s ear as Torbjörn mumbled about forgetting his toolkit, seemingly unaware of the moment he’d walked in on.

Angela felt her heart beating in her throat as Torbjörn waddled around the labs, picking up his things before leaving with a wave of his claw.

Despite everything, Angela squished her face further against Amélie, curling into her as the Frenchwoman wrapped her up in her arms.

“Maybe another time, _chérie_ . When we are not functioning on two days of no sleep.” Amélie whispered, pressing a kiss to her temple before letting go. “ _Bon nuit_.”

It took all of Angela’s self control to wait until Amélie was well out of sight before slipping down the edge of the lab table and burying her face in her hands.

-|-

Doctor Mei-Ling Zhou did not do things by halves.

Her gift to the good doctor sat on the grounds outside the lab, a beautiful plum tree (a _Prunus mume_ , Mei told Angela) that lasted far beyond the other cuttings. It was as much a gift to Angela as a stern talking-to for the others snipping up flowers and letting them die after only a week.

Her labs were down the hall from Angela’s and their shared courtyard soon become a place for rest as much as it was to discuss their findings. The Eco-Watchpoint initiative was so far away from anything Angela had ever studied that she ate up any information the climatologist would give her.

Mei was set to head a team in Antarctica, the base there to be the primary and most well outfitted out of all the watchpoints. She spent most of her time at the Swiss base assembling other teams and writing up documentation and papers or working with Torbjörn on her drone.

> (“Cryostasis is not… Entirely safe,” Angela admitted when their conversation turned from the climate to Angela’s own field of expertise. “You’d have to be very careful.”
> 
> Mei’s face broke into a wide smile. “We’re doctors, careful is our middle name,” she teased.)

They sat back to back in the courtyard on a small stone bench, both with popsicles while Mei finished up her supplies list for her watchpoint and Angela was trying and failing to make progress on the Valkyrie suit.

The sun was too warm, filtering through the plum blossoms and it was so much easier to rest her head against Mei’s bun and chew idly on the popsicle and let her work sit unfinished in her lap. Through the open windows of her lab, music poured out and inside McCree and Fareeha were playing pretend, a hybrid of Cowboys and Robbers and Doctors, and Gorillas.

Growing up with Overwatch seemed to do wonders for Fareeha’s imagination.

When McCree and Fareeha caught Angela’s watching they both sent her a dramatic finger gun and a wink her her direction (though Fareeha’s was more of a blink). Angela pressed a dramatic hand to her forehead, sliding off the bench and into the grass, hand clutched over her heart.

Mei looked down at her curiously while McCree and Fareeha’s laughter carried across the grass.

“You in need of a doctor, darlin’?” McCree called from the window, Fareeha perched on his shoulders. “‘Round these parts I’m known as the _Love Doctor_.”

His drawl was met only with Mei and Angela both bursting into laughter as Angela sat up. “The only doctor we need is someone to check your fathead.” She shot back at him, and it was McCree’s turn to dramatically sag into the window.

“You wound me.” He called, but Fareeha had slid from his shoulders, taking his hat with her and his attention was on the chase.

Angela’s laughter petered out as she stretched in the grass, toes sinking into the warm dirt. She heard Mei excuse herself and waved a vague hand, too busy letting her eyes close in the sunlight to put too much thought into the hasty goodbye.

“I heard you were in need of a doctor.” A shadow passed in front of the sun, accompanying the lilting voice and Angela was already pink in the cheeks when she opened her eyes.

The dress Amélie wore was lilac, fluttering in the light breeze. One hand held the brim of her sunhat, the other offered to Angela, which the doctor took gratefully. Standing up to busied herself with brushing grass from her legs as Amélie sat down on the bench, head tilted to up to admire the plum tree, dappled sunlight catching along her cheekbones.

Angela felt incredibly underwhelming in shorts and a too-large hoodie stolen from Gabe’s room and she sat down next to Amélie carefully, pulling the sleeves over her hands.

They sat in silence for a while, Amélie examining the plum tree while Angela observed her and prayed to whatever god was listening that Fareeha’s game of hat-stealing had taken McCree far from the windows.

“It really is a beautiful place,” Amélie said finally, jolting Angela out of her worried thoughts.

“When Overwatch first asked me to work for them I never imagined I’d come home,” Angela said, tucking blonde strands behind her ear. “I always thought I’d be globetrotting, seeing the world from end to end, but I have to admit…”

She stared out across her small courtyard, to the Alps beyond, gleaming in the sunlight, then back to Amélie, her brown eyes and long eyelashes glittering in the sunlight.

“It’s quite nice to be home.” Angela said and dared to shift slightly closer to Amélie.

Amélie shifted in kind until their hips touched and Amélie’s hand slipped over Angela’s hidden in the sleeve.

“I do hope our encounter in the lab wasn’t too much,” Amélie said, fingers curling gently under the cuff, grazing the top of Angela’s knuckles, “you seemed… A little caught off guard.”

“I was. A little,” Angela said, then quickly added, “A lot, actually. I couldn’t imagine you liking someone like me.”

Amélie’s laugh caught up in the branches of the plum tree as she shook her head. “Why not, _chérie_ ? You are a delight, a brilliant scientist, and very _tempting_.”

The tease caught Angela off-guard, bringing heat to her cheeks and a smile across her lips as she hunched her shoulders. “I suppose I’ve never thought about romance. I’ve always been married to my work- keeping up the legacy.” She dragged the tip of her toe through the grass, fingers slipping out to hold the tips of Amélie’s.

“You’re admirable,” Amélie said and reached for a small box Angela hadn’t seen, placing it on the doctor’s lap. “This is for you. To make my intentions clear- and because you seem… Well versed in its language.”

Angela opened the box and in the soft white tissue was a red rose, petals rich and deep with life, thorns sharp under soft leafs. Its colours were rich and unfamiliar and Angela let her fingers tracer the petals before turning her face up to Amélie’s.

It was a simple declaration, as sweet, bold, and vulnerable as Amélie was in that moment.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to everyone on twitter for offering help and cheering me on! Thanks to Steph for cute Spanish pet names and for reading it over and Lauren for betaing and Micah for offering advice!! It was an effort from everyone and I am eternally grateful.
> 
> And special thanks for Jay to mentioning offhandedly how cute mercymaker would be and accidentally tripping me into this hole.


End file.
